Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Tio Cipot was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
NK Maribor ran out of time with NK Celje. The paperwork was open when the deadline passed, and a transfer that was almost done is now a transfer that never happened.
Mark Zabukovnik and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Filip Kurtovic has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 11 actions, 6.69, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
Successful dribbles: 17. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Squad14 Sep 2026
13 new faces, and NK Maribor are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
The clubs have shaken hands with NK Celje; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
There were 6 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Deadline passes with 22 signed and 5 gone
That is the business done at NK Maribor until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
A deal that was a phone call from completion at lunchtime was dead by midnight. NK Maribor will try again when the window opens; Koper may not be selling by then.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Tio Cipot falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Andijon had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
The bid was some way short and NK Maribor did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Nejc Viher, 18, plays like he has been here for years — 8.11
A mark of 8.11 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 18-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
The deal with Koper is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
This is not cover and nobody is pretending it is. $2.3M has been paid because Mark Zabukovnik is straightforwardly better than what was already here, and the club has decided to stop waiting.
Ažbe Jug and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The terraces31 Aug 2026
NK Maribor spend $2.3M on the signing the town wanted
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $2.3M for Mark Zabukovnik, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Tio Cipot provided it, and the 9.32 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
NK Maribor and NK Celje have settled on $2.3M. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.
There comes a point where a club either backs its own ambition or admits it does not have any. NK Maribor have paid $3.0M for Bruno Lourenço, which is the loudest way there is of saying which one it chose.
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Karol Borys did not need any: 7.91, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
The offer went to Koper this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at NK Maribor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about NK Maribor and NK Krka in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Rudar Velenje waiting with a shirt. Nobody at NK Maribor is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The hardest thing about being 18 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Nejc Viher did not need any: 8.16, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Ažbe Jug was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
7 goals in one match, Karol Borys on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of NK Maribor and NK Zavrc.
The offer went to Olimpija Ljubljana this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
The shirt still fits. Luka Krajnc is back at NK Maribor, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
Olimpija Ljubljana will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Antonio Marin has pre-agreed a move to NK Maribor, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
The name of Lan Vidmar has come up in conversations NK Maribor were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Hilal Soudani and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Luka Zahovič was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.45. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
NK Maribor asked and CSKA Moscow said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
At 20 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.